2018 Reading Year
2019-01-02
I didn't do this last year, for various reasons, and I think that
failure has a lot to do with why I allowed this journal, meandering
though it always has been, to lie fallow for most of the year. I
haven't been posting reviews of books here in quite some time - the
last time I did so was in September 2017 - and the why of that
would be long in the telling. I began to receive preview copies of
books from publishers, unprompted, and this set off some of the
anxiety I've written about in the past. Essentially, being someway
successful at judging other people's work doesn't sit well with my
brain chemistry. Sigh.
I have still been reading though, and posting whenever I started a
new book. I stopped using Goodreads in 2017, but have been keeping
decent records of my reading in my own way. Thanks to that, I have
a full list of all the books I read in 2018 on its own page. Some
of these books deserve special mention, so here are my Awards from
Ascraeus, 2018 edition!
Best Science Fiction Novel
Space Opera, Cathreynne Valente
There really isn't much of anything coherent I can say about this
book. It is glorious, wonderful, hillarious, sad, thrilling,
terrifying, filled to the gunwales with snark and devilment, glam
rock, odd eurovision vibes. I simply adore this book, and to hell
with the begrudgers who deride this as overwritten while writing
paens to Douglas Adams. Valente is one of my favourite writers in
any genre, and this book is simply amazing. Life is Beautiful. Life
is Stupid.
Honorable Mentions
Its hard to believe that the author of 84k, Claire North, is just
32, but then again, she first became a published author aged 16. I
heard an interview with her on the Imaginary Worlds Podcast, and
found her so engaging that I sought out this book. It simply blew
me away. Like some wildly successful drug dealer, I've been pushing
it on people ever since. Yes, this is Yet Another Dystopia, but
dystopias rarely come as well conceived and constructed as this
one. Emma Newman's Before Mars was another stand-out novel for me
this year. Every time she returns to this world she unpeels another
layer of herself, and I feel privileged to share in that journey.
This is the third in her Planetfall series, and you probably should
be familiar with the universe before tacking this one. It won't
disappoint.
Best Fantasy
The Poppy War, R.F. Kuang
Fantasy fiction has really been on a journey of creativity in
recent years, moving sharply away from the Medieval European
stereotypical churn of people like Robert Jordan and G.R.R.M.,
exploring other cultures and ideas as part of the fictional
experience. Of these, Kuang's book was an utter revelation this
year, swooping through the norms of the genre, smashing them to
pieces and assembling them like a Kintsugi masterwork. There are
elements of grimdark in these pages, but not too much; there are
elements of "magic school" here, but not too much; dense politics,
yes, but not too much. There are hints, here and there, that this
is a debut novel, some of the characters could be realised a bit
better, but those are nitpicks. This is a great book, and I look
forward to the sequel.
Honorable Mentions
Almost any of the other Fantasy Books I read this year deserve
mention, from Martha Wells ridiculously under-appreciated The
Element of Fire, Katherine Arden's well-regarded russian-inspired
The Bear and the Nightingale, S.A. Chakraborty's brilliant
djinn-fantasy debut City of Brass, all the way to Rati Mehrotra's
Markswoman. I've had a great year of fantasy reading thanks to
these women and many others.
Best Non SF/F Genre
Gather the Daughters, Jennie Melamed
The book that I tell people should just be called "Trigger
Warning". This is one of the two books that have just stayed with
me all year. I read this back in June, and I still think of it
regularly. It defies categorisation, much as Scott Hawkins Library
at Mount Char does, and like that novel this is one tough read. I'm
not joking about the Trigger Warning, this one needs them for Rape,
Child Abuse, Rape, Institutionalized Savagery, Rape, Incest, and
Rape. Unlike so many dystopian works though, these are never
presented in any sort of prurient or voyeuristic fashion, you
really believe that these terrible things are being done to real
women, real girls. Melamed writes with confidence, incredibly this
is her debut novel, and with professional experience and expertise
(she's a psychiatric nurse who works with traumatized children).
This book is dark, darker than any grimdark, it often makes for
difficult, uncomfortable reading. It is ominous, it is disturbing,
but it is brilliant. I couldn't put it down, I didn't want it to
end. Its that good.
Honorable Mentions
Jaroslav Kalfar's Spaceman of Bohemia is technically sf, but it
really isn't. Nominated for this year's Clarke Award, I broke my
reading pattern for the year for this, and I'm glad. This is a
delightful, weird novel, kind of like "The Martian" except well
written and emotional featuring believable people. I guess you
could describe it as a rumination on loss, identity and love. In
ways it reminds me of Kim Stanley Robinson's "Aurora", but I found
this even better. I ploughed through this book, and loved it to
pieces, finding it almost cathartic.
Worst Book of the Year
None. Not one. I have a few DNFs, but I don't consider either of
those books bad, they just weren't for me. I'm far more interested
in celebrating what I read.
And Finally
There are incredible works out there, these are just a tiny
sampling. Take a look at the full list, see if anything there takes
your fancy, tell me about it if you do. I despair at the sort of
Year End Lists which serve up genre as some sort of White Male
extravaganza, and chose my reading this year as some sort of
personal reaction to that, which I found so prevalent at the end of
last year. This has been a great years reading, and my TBR is
positively brimming with books for 2019. Now that publishers have
stopped sending me books, I'll even start writing proper reviews
again (hopefully).
+++ENDS+++